"Ubuntu, once the darling of desktop Linux and the overwhelmingly popular choice for newcomers, may soon lose that role to Mint." I switched to Mint KDE, and have no intention of going back. By the way, KDE4 is finally good (don't hit me, Aaron) - fast, fluid, stable, pretty, and thanks to its versatility, a joy to use after a few hours of tweaking. Just... Please, unify Plasma and the regular widget style. This is insanity.

I may not be able to say much about the data, but the sentiment of Ubuntu for me personally has turned around. After seeing the Ubuntu phone, instead of being happy I was disappointed. Not because the phone or UI is bad, but because the strategy is not one of an open source or free software project.

In the past, people used to leave when projects became stagnant. Today, it seems there's plenty of development in all of Kde, Gnome, and Unity, but a lot of this work is pissing people off.

The Unix "style" is one of careful conventions and small tools which work together. We are instead heading towards an Apple style of integrated tools, large monolithic GUIs, etc. They all advocate for operational design over elegant component architecture. All in search for a mythical grandma.